"Sharp, quirky, and occasionally nettlesome", Walking the Berkshires is my personal blog, an eclectic weaving of human narrative, natural history, and other personal passions with the Berkshire and Litchfield Hills as both its backdrop and point of departure. I am interested in how land and people, past and present manifest in the broader landscape and social fabric of our communities. The opinions I express here are mine alone. Never had ads, never will.

April 29, 2010

Our family archives, rich in material for some branches of the tree as they are, contain very little first hand testimony as to why my ancestors enlisted in various Union regiments (and one Confederate) during the Civil War. Their pension records provide some clues, along with a rare surviving letter or two, but there is nothing definitive about their motivations for doing so. Still, one can draw a few inferences.

Brothers Theodore and Nathaniel Abbott were 19 and 17 years old respectively according to the 1860 census and lived in New York City. Theodore was a mechanic who enlisted in May, 1861 in the 9th New York (Hawkin's Zouaves) and served for a two year enlistment. Nathaniel joined the 133rd NY (2nd Metropolitans), a unit that recruited heavily from the metropolitan police force in which his father was then a policeman and in which the son would also serve after the war.

There were a number of younger Abbott siblings as well as their maternal grandmother living in their apartment, so one of their motives may have been the 13 dollars a month (and in Nathaniel's case, an enlistment bounty) to provide support for the family. Theodore''s early enlistment in a flamboyant Zouave unit may also indicate a sense of adventure. Nathaniel fell sick soon after arriving at Fort Monroe and was left behind when his regiment sailed for Louisiana, but the following year he enrolled in the 10th Regiment Veteran Reserve Corps and served until late 1865. Whether money or patriotism prompted his reenlistment can only be speculated but he was certainly under no legal obligation to do so.

Private William Taylor was mustered into Company A, 1st
NY "Lincoln" Cavalry on July 27th, 1861 in New York City. A first generation immigrant from England, a weaver by trade with a wife and young family, he chose a branch of service for which he may not have been suited, for he was discharged disabled that October after been thrown from a horse at Camp Meigs in Washington, D.C. Again, gainful employment may have motivated his service, but perhaps also a feeling of duty to his new country. He died from complications from his injuries in 1864.

Young Samuel Barker, Jr. lied about his age to enlist in the 37th Wisconsin Infantry in March, 1865. He and his unhappily married mother and young sister were living in poverty when he enrolled. He served less than 90 days and was sick in camp as well when the war ended. The enlistment bounty was a prime motivator for him, according to a surviving family letter.

William Nisbet Olmsted was a member of the elite 7th NYSM, a bandbox regiment which claimed members from the best of New York City Society. He served for one month at the outset of the war, marching to the Capitol and purloining Congressional Stationery before heading back to New York and a career in the China Trade. For him, he met his obligation as a gentleman to show courage and do his duty but appears had no stronger attachment to fighting in the cause of the Union.

The Confederate Brigadier from New Jersey, Archibald Gracie, Jr. fought for the honor of his wife and mother's people who were from the South, initially as captain of a militia company in Mobile where he had managed his family's business interests since resigning from the US Infantry in 1856.

Charles G. Johnson of New York was a wagoner,
Company B, 5th New York Volunteer Inf. (Duryea's Zouaves) 1861-1863 and then for a third year in Company G., 146th New York Volunteer Inf. He was a deeply religious man and this may well have helped him withstand the stress of long service, as McPherson notes in For Cause and Comrades, but I do not know whether he held abolitionist sentiments. Nor do I know what motivated Jesse M. Jones to enlist as Hospital Steward on the U.S.S. Monitor, but he fortuitously resigned before the ironclad foundered off Cape Hatteras.

Patriotism, a better life, belonging to something bigger than themselves. Bonds of family, class and friendship. Honor and courage and the ideals of manhood. I sense that these may have been behind some of their decisions to fight. The fact of their service does not mean that they were at all times heroic, nor that they held to the highest of purposes. They were, after all, human beings with human frailties. But they did enlist, and in some cases reenlist, and whether they stepped off at the very outset or in the very last moments of the war, all of them volunteered and for whatever personal reasons felt it was the right choice.

April 08, 2010

Heather Wilkinson Rojo at "Nutfield
Genealogy" has very kindly recognized Walking the Berkshires with an Ancestor Approved Award. What tickles me most about this honor, aside from the very kind words about my writing style, is the dour faced look of disapproval sported by the matronly mascot of this genea-blogging distinction. That old girl's no Mona Lisa: more American Gothic.

The idea behind the Ancestor Approved Award is to highlight excellent blogging from the genealogy community and challenge those so recognized to list 10 things we have learned in their course of our ancestral research that have surprised, humbled or enlightened us. Here then, are my 10 lessons learned.

1. You've Got a Friend: I think many of us are drawn to genealogy for the thrill of the chase and the opportunity to personalize the past. Our own bloodlines may be the hook, but genealogists tend to be a generous bunch and are just as excited to learn about each other's stories and research as in documenting our own. And we do love a good story. Finding this supportive community online was a pleasant surprise for me when I added genealogy to the rotation of post topics at Walking the Berkshires.

2. God Bless Google Books: Genealogy is not simply a matter of vital statistics. It is more about the lives of the people that these names and dates represent. Applying the skills of the historian, the archeologist, the social scientist and psychologist really animates family history for me. To that end, as a non academic researcher I swear by the gold mine of source material represented by Google Books. Querying this trove has delivered untold data on countless ancestors, the communities in which they lived. In many cases this results in completely new information that changes my understanding of who they were and what they did, Idly searching for information on one of my Revolutionary War era ancestors with Google Books, for example, revealed evidence in Washington's correspondence of a court martial. Among the many happy results were this 11 post series on the Court Martial of Matthias Ogden and a connection to a group of avid reenactors who depict the New Jersey regiment that Col. Ogden commanded.

4. Maybe it Ain't So: There is still no substitute for primary source material. It is amazing how much bad history gets repeated as subsequent authors take at face value the claims made in other texts . Sometimes the silences say more than false claims. A privately printed genealogy of the Walker branch in my mother's pedigree from the early 1900s identifies the revolutionary war service of a collateral relation, but neglects to mention his subsequent and much longer service as an officer in the Pennsylvania Loyalists. The only clue was that his father's will provided for grandchildren in New Brunswick, Canada after the war.

" 5. Ancestor Worship is not Good History: A good genealogist respects good data even while paying respect to one's forebears. We take tours through the intimate details of our ancestor's lives. We look in their underwear drawers and read their private letters. If it turns out that they were more complex human beings with real flaws and contradictions - in other words, that they were human - we have an obligation to treat them fairly and honestly.

7. Sooner or Later, You Become the Source: Good bloggers are good aggregators. People searching for topics of an historical or genealogical nature are often lead to my blog. On matters having little or no family connection, like the Morro Castle Disaster about which I blogged four years ago, I still get daily hits. Once you go back a half dozen generations or so, the odds of sharing a common ancestor with others doing family history expand exponentially. A post I wrote about my grandfather's experience as a doctor in wartime lead the son of one of the officers he served with to my site, as well as the grand-niece of a man who died on the Liberty Ship later that took my grandfather to the South Pacific.

8. Expect the Unexpected: When searching the 1860 Census Records to try to close a gap in my primary Abbott line, I found that my Gr-great grandfather had an older brother. Since I was at the National Archives, I searched under his name for a Civil War service record, and discovered that he had enlisted in the 9th NY Hawkin's Zouaves. Not only that, but his pension record gave me additional data that helped with my inquiry into his parents, and also revealed where he died out in Montana. A few years later, I was vacationing at Glacier National Park and called up the nearby Old Soldiers Home that had been his final residence and in about 30 seconds found the number and location of his grave.

9. All in Good Fun: Remember, no matter how passionate our interest in the lives of our ancestors, not too take things too seriously. 19th Century Facial Hair and old family photos have tremendous comic possibilities. For me, this prompted a long running and very popular Family Archive Caption Contest.

10. Life is for the Living: The family history at greatest risk of disappearing is being made now, and is still in the minds of those still with us. Every genealogist I have ever known regrets not asking more of those now departed who could have told us more. The memories we make now will enliven the past for those who come after.

And now the fun part. To share the love and pass on this award, Here are 10 worthy genea-bloggers whose fine work has inspired me and who do their family history proud:

March 16, 2008

Regular commenter David Corbett has asked so nicely to see more of my one guilty pleasure that I could hardly refuse. Here, then, are some of the toy American Civil War soldiers in my personal collection. I add to their ranks when I can and most recently acquired 9 figures from the "Brooklyn 14th" that have just been issued by The Collectors Showcase. Like the rest of my collection, these are matte finished metal figures in 1:32 scale (54mm), but I have just started collecting from this manufacturer. These particular pieces are extremely well done, historically accurate right down to the double row of brass buttons on their chasseur jackets.

I found a central location for them on a shelf with other figures compatible with a depiction of the Battle of 1st Manassas (or Bull Run, if you prefer). I've condensed the action considerably, but there are two Zouave units represented here: Company K of the 69th N.Y.S.M.by the discontinued Troiani Historical Miniatures company, and a recreation of a Don Troiani painting by Conte Collectibles depicting the 11th NY "Fire Zouaves" breaking under a charge by the 1st Virginia Cavalry, lead by a blue clad J.E.B. Stuart. The 2nd Rhode Island in their light blue blouses also makes an appearance in two sets by Forward March, while an ordinance wagon pulled by a mule team from the venerable William Britain company withdraws from the line. I understand that Zouaves don't sell particularly well in this hobby, which I cannot understand as I am always looking for some of these colorful units done well by one or another manufacturer. I had Abbott and Livingston ancestors in the 5th, 9th and 146th New York Zouaves, so it's personal.

In the late 1990s there was a renaissance in realistic, as opposed to "toy soldier" styles, which prior to then had been largely the domain of ultra expensive Russian manufacturers who did museum quality matte finished pieces and a few smaller operators. W. Britains and Conte developed extensive Civil War lines during this period and I collected them heavily. When lead sculptor Ken Osen left Britains for Conte, I followed, and when he moved on to Troiani and then helped launch Old Northwest Trading Company I collected those as well. Now back with Britains, the quality and detail continues to excel. You would think it might not be so difficult to get this historical period right, but many manufactures and sculptors fail to pull it off. Conte has gotten almost cartoonish and grotesque in recent years and had trouble getting the paint right or staying in scale. Britains went through a long dry spell before Richard Walker took over the reins and Ken Osen came back on board.

Collectors of high end Civil War toy soldiers tend to be found in US markets East of the Mississippi. There are a disproportionate number of figures representing the armies of the Eastern Theater of the war than those who fought in the West. I am still hoping that Britians will issue a couple of Army of Tennessee flag bearers with the Hardee and Polk pattern flags. I pulled together the scene at right using Iron brigade figures by Britains, Conte and Troiani with some additions figures by these manufacturers to represent Grant with some of his westerners. I tried to hide them from view, but you can just make out the red circle badge of the 1st Division, 1st Corps of the Army of the Potomac on the kepi of one of the officers.

Some genres lend themselves to uniform ranks or duplicate poses. For the kind of money these cost, I have no desire to pay for the same figure twice. Conte ill-advisedly released a Union and Confederate marching set of 6 figures in three poses, and I bought a split confederate set on eBay and passed on the Yanks. Even if the same sculpts are used, a different paint job and a different head is all it would take to diversify the offerings, as some manufacturers have found. Recycled poses are fine except when union cap badges end up on confederate heads. I've got a lot of these now, feel entitled to be picky about what I add to the collection.

Of course, I have a wish list. Besides the Zouaves and flag bearers already mentioned, the cavalry units in my collection are quite thin. I'd like to see some of the Heavy Artillery regiments like the 1st ME or Litchfield's own 2nd CT that Grant converted to Infantry and fed into the furnace at Cold Harbor and Petersburg. It is probably too much to ask for any of Gracie's Alabama Brigade, which would cover the confederate side of the family tree rather nicely. There seem to be very few offerings of confederate NCOs who are doing something other than carrying flags. The Civil War doesn't offer collectors the range of vehicles of all that WWII armor, but I'd like a caisson to go with the six horse team and limber that Britains put out early this decade, and maybe a sanitary commission ambulance and sutler's wagon. Heck, I'd even go for a stampeding Congressman and his lady overtaken in their chaise after the rout at Bull Run. Just not all at once. I have to space out my purchases and stay on budget to keep my finances and my marriage afloat. Here are a few more shots of what is on my top shelves that you may click to enlarge.

January 19, 2008

Our friend Tom has a water-filled quarry, a deep, north-facing grotto with sheer walls and perfect for summer skinny-dipping. In winter, though, it is an idyllic setting for a neighborhood skating party, and Tom has boxes of vintage skates for those who come without. Before last week's snow, when the ice was clear and the day was warm, Tom started calling up friends who descended the switchback path singly and in groups for a happy day on the ice.

I never get to skate the way I used to do, having grown up at a boarding school with an ice rink. There was a time when ice hockey looked like the one team sport in which I might develop sufficient skills to advance to higher levels, but the prep school I attended was in mid-Atlantic Delaware, where the pond rarely froze and they wrestled in winter instead. My sister, on the other hand, went to Groton where she became a skilled hockey player, and I'd imagine she would skate circles around me today if we ever were together in a cold clime again for a pick up game of pond hockey.

I love skating outdoors better than almost anything else in winter. Spending New Year's at Windrock, or gathering two weeks later to celebrate Gran's birthday, my cousins and I always hoped it had been cold enough to freeze the cranberry bogs slick and smooth, with flooded plants and even fish visible under the black ice. There is also spring-fed Zeke's Pond down the beach where we would meet up to skate, and one very cold winter the bay itself froze, and I decided that rather than walk to the pond I would skate to it.

There was less risk involved than you might think. Emerson reminds us that "In skating over thin ice, our safety is in our speed." The rise and fall of the tide tends to break up the ice by the shore, and thrusts it up where the rocks break the surface. Once over that, though, it is a silent world, for there are no waves to lap at the beach, and the ice is thick and strong for a mile or more out on the shallow bay. The salt leaves a film of slush and rime on the ice and is not something you would want to expose new skates to, but mine were inherited from my Dad and were state of the art in the early 1960s. Every now and then there is a thin crack in the ice but these are easily negotiated. Skating over the bay reminded me of my Gr-great aunt Maudie Livingston, who spent Christmas with us one winter and told mesmerizing stories of her girlhood in Newburgh, New York when she skated on the Hudson and jumped over the cracks in the river ice.

Quarry skating is not so extreme, but has an exotic allure of its own. The immediate edge of the ice at Tom's had melted away from the marble walls, but the rest of the surface was thick and creamy white. There were patches that had gotten softer in the pale winter sunlight, and places where leaves had frozen in the ice, but most of it was perfect for new skaters and old, rusty pros. Emily and Elias had only skated once before, and this was a banner day for both. Emily discovered that she could totter along without assistance, while Elias on his double blades learned that as much fun as it was to push a chair along for balance, far better was to sit in it while I pushed and he whacked at hockey pucks with an over-sized stick. There were sleds adapted for towing, and as many as five children piled into the largest while two of the men towed them in gleeful circles around the quarry. There were cocoa and cellared apples and homemade cookies all around. Currier and Ives never etched a more whimsical scene or a finer winter memory.

May 27, 2007

On this Memorial Day weekend when we honor those who served in our nation's wars, I recall my ancestors (both near relations and more distant) who fought during the American Civil War. The predecessor to Memorial Day was Decoration Day, with origins claimed by both North and South and even by the African American community in war-ravaged Charleston, SC. I include in this roster the Confederates in the family as well as those who wore the Federal Blue and fought to preserve the Union (or for personal reasons of their own).

Nathaniel B. Abbott: Drummer, Company K, 133rd New York Volunteer Inf. (2nd Metropolitans) 1862-1863; Company A, 10th Regiment, Veteran Reserve Corps (V.R.C.) 1863-1865. (He was left behind sick with Typhoid at Fortress Monroe when his regiment sailed to join Banks in Louisiana and was discharged 1/3 disabled in February, 1863. He reenlisted in the V.R.C in June, 1863 and served until November, 1865. Family tradition has him beating the long roll at Lincoln's funeral)

Charles G. Johnson: Wagoner, Company B, 5th New York Volunteer Inf. (Duryea's Zouaves) 1861-1863; Wagoner, Company G., 146th New York Volunteer Inf. (Garrard's Tigers) 1863, 1864; Wagon master; 1st Division (Griffin's), Vth Corps, Army of the Potomac 1864 (Enlisted for 3 years, served 2 years with 5th New York from Big Bethel to Chancellorsville, transferred with 3 years men to 146th New York and served with this unit from Gettysburg to North Anna)

[ He was my step Great-great Grandfather on the Livingston side.]

Jesse M. Jones: Hospital Steward, U.S.S. "Monitor" 1862. (Served during the epic battle of the Ironclads at Hampton Roads, VA, discharged in October 1862 before the "Monitor" was lost off Cape Hatteras, NC)

[ He was the first husband of my step Gr-great grandmother (2nd wife of Nathaniel Abbott) on the Abbott side.]

William N. Olmsted: Private, 7th New York State Militia 1861 (Served 30 days in the defense of Washington, D.C. at the outbreak of hostilities.)

[ He was my Gr-great grandfather on the Olmsted side.]

William Taylor: Trooper, company A, 1st New York Volunteer Cav. (Lincoln Cavalry) 1861 (fell from horse during training in October 1861 and discharged disabled, died of complications from injury in 1864).

Modern words do not adequately express what these me thought and did, why they fought and what the sacrificed. I honor in them what I do not fully comprehend, knowing that all was not as it appears in rose-tinted memory. Better to let the words of Abraham Lincoln speak for themselves:

"Four score and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth upon this continent a new nation: conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.

Now we are engaged in a great civil war...testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated...can long endure. We are met on a great battlefield of that war.

We have come to dedicate a portion of that field as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.

But in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate...we cannot consecrate...we cannot hallow this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who fought here have consecrated it, far better than our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember, what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be here dedicated to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced.

It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us...that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion...that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain...that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom...and that the government of the people, by the people...for the people...shall not perish from the Earth."

February 25, 2007

Not everyone is lucky enough to be a dead ringer for a really attractive celebrity. I, myself, am occasionally compared to Jack Black, or worse, to Mickey Dolenz, but at least I'm man enough to admit it. Two of my great grandparents (mother of the bride and father of the groom) are remarkably like two actors who graced the large and small screens in the 1960s. See if you can figure out who the dopplegangers might be for my great grandmother Alice Schoonmaker Livingston and great grandfather Charles Henry Abbott.

Yes indeed, they resemble no one so much as Mary Poppins (at least attired similarly to Julie Andrews) and the first television portrayer of Gomez Addams, John Astin. But why not be the judge yourselves? As always, click to enlarge.

Uncanny, I call it.

Meanwhile, there is still time to avail yourselves of the opportunity to find good hearted humor at my ancestors' expense by weighing in in the 4th, and possibly last Walking the Berkshires Family Archive Caption Contest. The estimable Bill West seems set to walk away with the winner's laurels once again, but this time uncontested, and I know there are witticisms just waited to burst forth into the limelight to give him a run for his money.

I await your brilliant contributions here. And that means you, Charlottesvillain and Tigerhawk. Don't let the family side down!

December 16, 2006

I have always loved this family photograph, although I cannot say for certain who these people are. They are my Grandma Clara Abbott's family, almost certainly Livingstons, and the fellow dead center in the tobaggon bears a close resemblance to my Gr-great grandfather Walter Livingston who was boss of a coal yard in Newburgh, New York in the 1890s. With those thick mechanic's mustaches it is hard to distinguish one from the other.

The expressions on these dapper downhill dare-devils are priceless - the two gentlemen on the two seater sled seem particularly droll. The assortment of late 19th century hats and outerwear suggests a Sunday outing. In fact, this may be one of the earliest examples of that stalwart Christmas tradition, the posed family photograph. Whoever they are, I hope they enjoyed the end of their run as much as they appear to have enjoyed mugging for the camera at mid-slope.

These three urchins are my Great Grandfather William Livingston (at right) and his younger brothers Frank (at left) and Clarence. The photographer's studio reproduced a winter setting for this photograph: a badly scratched tintype from the late 1880s. I actually repaired some of the damage digitally - otherwise Uncle Frank's face would have been pocked beyond recognition.

Winter's monochrome palette lends itself to the medium of early photography. There is a sweetness in the image of these little boys, solemnly bundled up in a faux winter wonderland. One hopes they will partake in the gaiety of the overdressed sledding party when they step outside the studio and that it is not blistering summer instead.

November 11, 2006

Yesterday was Veterans Day (observed) in the United States, and some people had a paid holiday. I prefer to spare a thought on the eleventh day of the eleventh month for the Armistice that ended the first great cataclysm of the 20th century: one with repercussions that echo to the present day although just a handful of soldiers from the Great War are still with us. What they endured defies description. Imagine English platoons kicking footballs ahead of the charge at the Somme to distract the men from the shells and machine guns and the 400 murderous yards they had to cross to reach the German trenches! In 1942 more than half the men being cared for in our V.A. hospitals were "shell shocked" casualties of the First World War.

Two of my Gr-great uncles were veterans of the Great War, both in the 27th (New York) Division. These medals were awarded to Sergeant Stanley Clark of Newburgh, New York, who served in one of the National Guard units that comprised the 27th Division. Others like them appear on the uniform of the soldier above, Edward "Ned Olmsted", who served from the Spanish American War until 1936 when he retired as a Brigadier General.

Ned Olmsted enlisted as a private artificer on May 17th, 1898 in the elite Squadron "A" Cavalry of the New York National Guard. These photographs were taken of him and his wife, Clementine Davidson Ladley, around the time of their marriage in 1901 when he was a corporal. He served with the cavalry as a citizen soldier while employed as an "engineer salesman" for various companies in Philadelphia and New Jersey.

During the early 1900s Olmsted advanced through the grades in the cavalry as sergeant, 1st lieutenant (as he appears at right) and finally as Captain of the 4th Troop of Squadron "A". In 1912 he was appointed as aide to Major General John F. O'Ryan, commander of the New York National Guard, and from this point on he served as a staff officer and his career was closely linked to that of the Maj. General. He is mounted at left on a regimental horse named "Brooklyn" at training excises in Fishkill, Dutchess County, New York.

In 1916 Major Ned Olmsted was Assistant Chief of Staff of the Sixth Division under General O'Ryan on the Mexican Border in the hunt for Pancho Villa. The entire national Guard was called up to patrol the Texas border while the regular army units under General Pershing rode in pursuit of Villa. Maj Olmsted and the New York troops were based at Fort McAllen, Texas. O'Ryan was a strict disciplinarian and dedicated to bringing his National Guard units up to the regular army standard. he was an early advocate of "live fire" training exercises and his methods often produced spectacular results. Far from idling away along the Rio Grande, the New York Troops were trained under conditions similar to those then prevailing in Europe where the United States was not yet a belligerent. Soon after returning from Texas, this training would be put to the test as America entered the Great War.

The New York Guard Units were reorganized in 1917 as the 27th Division. Its insignia, at left, includes a symbol representing the letters NYD for New York Division, against the stars of the constellation Orion, a clever play on the name of its commander. On August 30, 1917, the 27th Division paraded down 5th Avenue passed the New York Public Library where there was a reviewing stand for immediate families. After months of training and further reorganization they embarked for Europe in the Spring of 1918.

Edward Olmsted, still on O'Ryan's staff, had preceded them, having in the meantime graduated from the Special Course for Intelligence Officers at the Army War College in Washington, DC. He served as Major and Lt-Colonel in France and Belgium as Assistant Chief of Staff, G-1, in the 27th Division.

The 27th was initially stationed in the East Poperinghe Line, and participated in actions at Dickebusch Lake and Vierstratt Ridge during the late summer of 1918, and then in September the struggle to break the formidable German defenses of the Hindenburg Line. On September 25th, the division participated in the Somme Offensive and provided a break through of the Hindenburg Line itself forcing the Germans into general retreat. After a final confrontation with the retreating Germans at the Le Selle River the Armistice ended the fighting and the division was sent home in February of 1919, to be mustered out several months later." New York State Military Museum

Uncle Ned came home from the war with many souvenirs, including a Prussian officer's spike helmet which my grandmother remembered playing with as a girl. She who was so loathe to part with the very least of our family items - battlefield loot among them- shook her head with disapproval when recalling that his entire collection of militaria from the trenches of Europe had been given to Pingry School in Elizabeth, NJ which Uncle Ned had attended as a boy.

A fine photographic record of his military career remains, however, and records his advancement in the peacetime National Guard of New York and later New Jersey. He received the Distinguished Service Medal and numerous other decorations honoring his campaigns and long service. He was Acting Chief of Staff for the 27th Division after the War until 1924, when he transferred to the New Jersey National Guard as Assistant Chief of Staff (G-4) for Major General Quincey Gilmore, commanding the 44th Division, and later Colonel and Chief of Staff of the 44th Division under Major General John Toffey.

After 37 years in the military, Uncle Ned Olmsted was promoted to Brigadier General in 1935 and resigned from the New Jersey National Guard, transferring to reserve status in the New York N.G. so that the following January he could retire from the armed forces of the State in which he served for the majority of his career.

The proceedings of the Thirteenth Reunion of the Olmsted Family, held at the Hotel Martinique in New York City on October 24th, 1936, feature an extensive biography honoring his military career and years of public service. He was extremely proud of his Olmsted heritage and both a loyal member and frequent officer of the Olmsted Family Association since its founding in 1911.

Uncle Ned Olmsted died in 1941. The war dead from the Great War are estimated at more than 9,450,000 - not including civilian casualties and the 20 million who died in the Great Influenza of 1918 that nearly carried off my grandmother. Today, there are no more than 51 veterans who survive from those terrible years of 1914-1918. We shall not see their like again.

August 19, 2006

My Gr-gr-great grandfather, William Taylor, served briefly in the Union cavalry at the outbreak of the Civil War before a fall from a horse rendered him unfit for service. He died from complications of his disability in 1864. In 1922, his destitute widow was still without a pension. The extraordinary file I discovered in the National Archives on her survivor's claim has been a boon for me as a family historian, but it is also the record of an illiterate and impoverished widow struggling unsuccessfully with government bureaucracy unmoved by her plight.

This colorized tintype was among my Grandmother Clara Livingston Abbott's effects and identified by her as Great Grandfather Taylor. The shell jacket and early war pattern Hardee Hat with crossed sabers identifies him as a cavalryman, and my grandmother's people were from Newburgh, New York. Determining that his name was William Taylor ,and a search of Civil War Muster Rolls from New York while on a trip to Washington in 2000, produced his brief service record.

Private William Taylor was mustered into Company A, 1st NY "Lincoln" Cavalry on July 27th, 1861 in New York City. This was the first volunteer cavalry regiment accepted into US service during the Civil War. He was 32 years old, a recent immigrant from England and a weaver by trade with a wife and three small children. Like many volunteers in the Union cavalry, he may not have known how to ride.

In September, while riding at Camp Meigs in Washington, Pvt. Taylor was thrown from his mount and landed hard on stony ground, causing internal injuries. After what must have been three weeks of agony in hospital, he was discharged for disability in early October, 1861. The examining surgeon certified that he was incapable of performing the duties of a soldier because of "spinal irritation, produced by an injury of the spine" and thought "probably several months must elapse before his recovery, though his injuries are not likely to prove permanent."

"When he was in the service,he was thrown from a horse and injured his back and kidneys so as to cause bleeding from the rectum. Being in a very weakened state, he contracted Typhoid fever from which he died. He left four small children."

The family had by then moved to Roxbury, now a part of Boston, Massachusetts, and the City Registrar provided a record of his death, November 26, 1864, with "bleeding from the bowels" listed as the cause. His injuries apparently did not prevent his siring a fourth child born the year before, but typhoid could easily have been aggravated by a weakened constitution and the rectal bleeding is consistent with the internal damage he had previously sustained. As will be seen, however, this evidence was deemed far from conclusive by the examining authorities considering Eliza Taylor's pension applications.

The General Pension Act of 1862 provided Union veterans and their surviving Dependants benefits based on rank, degree of disability, and term of service. This act and its subsequent renewals placed a high burden of proof on applicants to show proof of enlistment, that their injuries or disabilities were related to wartime service, that they were of sober habits and, if widowed, had neither remarried nor been living in notorious cohabitation. With nearly 2 million Union veterans added to the rolls during the Civil War, the amount of paperwork and documentation involved was extraordinary and a great bureaucracy arose around pensions which included a new building for the Bureau of Pensions (completed in 1887), lawyers who specialized in veterans' claims, and organizations like the Grand Army of the Republic which advocated for increased veterans benefits.

As the decades passed, veterans benefits did expand. Those whose disabilities prevented them from performing manual labor were deemed eligible for veterans pension under the Dependant Pension Act of 1890, and many new applicants filed (a Gr-gr-great Uncle, Theodore Abbott of the 9th NY "Hawkins Zouaves" among them). Term of service remained a key limitation, and Pvt. Taylor's less than 90 days in the "Lincoln" Cavalry prevented his wife and children from applying for a pension during the rest of the 19th century.

Eliza Taylor lived with her son, William, for the rest of her life. She moved with him to New Windsor, now part of Newburgh, then followed him back to Boston for another seven years before returning to Newburgh where her daughter Clara (standing next to her mother at right) met and married my Great-gr-grandfather Walter Livingston - the bearer of an ancient name but not of fortune. These were struggling, working class people but well thought of in the Newburgh community, which as it turned out was a critically important to Eliza Taylor when seeking testimonials as to her moral character from neighbors in her pension application.

Her 1905 pension application was rejected on grounds that she could not provide testimony from the doctor who attended her husband on his deathbed that he died of causes directly attributable to his wartime disability. The doctor was by that time also deceased. Nor did she have an example of her husband's signature (and she herself signed her affidavits with an "X"). She secured letters from her sister-in-law in Philadelphia. Finally - and it took more than ten years for the Pension Bureaucracy to confirm this - she was without title even under the most recent Pension act because her husband was discharged two weeks shy of the required 90 days service.

These is a sense of pathos and desperation in these pension files. There is an undated letter in a thick and shaky hand from Eliza Taylor's son, William, to the Commissioner of Pensions that stands out in bold relief amid the piles of official correspondence and cool, typewritten responses:

Hon Mr Saltzgaber

Dear Sir - My Mother has Got a honorable Discharge Paper for Physical Disability of Farthers he Enlisted in the Lincoln Calvery New Yourk to serve 3 years but he only served 70 days i Would like to know if he is entitled to a Pension under the Law his Name Was Wm Taylor We Was told to Write you and find out Please let me know...

This letter by itself had no impact, but the family started to enlist the help of area legislators. Thomas W Bradley of the 20th NY district in 1911, Edmund Platt of the 26th District in 1916, and then Hamilton Fish in 1921 all used their influence. Congressman Bradley notes in his letter to the Commissioner of Pensions that "This old lady is now in frail health and destitute financially, and has the sympathetic interest of leading people of Newburgh." Nothing could be done, however, until the Pension laws were again changed in 1920, finally allowing claims by Dependants of Union soldiers with less than 90 days in service.

But here a new complication arose. Eliza Taylor was now 90 years old and there was no one living besides her children who had known her for the full period following her husband's death in Boston. Her marriage status was questioned, and there is even - I can only assume misfiled since there is nothing else in the record to support it - a scrap of paper contained in her pension record rejecting a claim for pension application made in 1921 by the widow of a soldier named Elliott D. Stone on the grounds that both before and since his death the woman had been living in "notorious and adulterous cohabitation" and the first marriage had not been dissolved by divorce! Whether this red herring fouled Eliza Taylor's application I cannot say, but a special inquiry was called at Conressman Fish's insistance to review her application and determine whether she had at any time remarried since 1864. Some of the previous material in her file had not been notarized and these also were required to be put in order before the claim could proceed.

The investigator took her affidavits once more and stated that he found all the testimony from her and her supporters to be of the highest order and that they were people of the first-class. Nonetheless, while he could find no evidence that she had ever remarried in New York, he felt compelled to refer the matter to Boston to account for the years spent there and there the record ends. There is no evidence that my Gr-gr-great Grandmother ever received a pension.

This family photograph, taken in Newburgh in 1908, shows Eliza Taylor holding her great granddaughter Clara Leanor (Livingston) Abbott, flanked by daughter Clara (Taylor) Livingston and grandson William Edward Livingston. Clara Abbott was my grandmother. She almost never looked back at the past, and only in her final years and because it was clearly of interest to her family did she set down her reminiscences of what was a difficult and lonely childhood. Still, there was a box of old tintypes and turn of the century photographs that she helped me identify, including the brown eyed cavalryman William Taylor and his aged widow Eliza. Their story, housed in the vaults of an impersonal bureaucracy that failed to acknowledge a widow's pension claim, is nonetheless priceless to me.

It makes a grand ballad and was fun to write. A tip 'o the tam o shanter to Richard Thompson for the original ballad. The truth of the matter is a bit more complex.

The Livingston Manor was a vast landholding of over 175,000 acres in much of what is today Columbia County, NY. Robert Livingston the 1st Lord extended his holdings with the Patent of Westenhook in 1705 which laid claim to lands over and beyond the Taconic Range. There were as many as six Dutch families living as tenants of the Livingstons in what is now Mt. Washington, MA by the end of the 17th century, well before Massachusetts started awarding patents to freely settle towns in the southern Berkshires.

Willem Rees was of Dutch ancestry and part of a family which settled on the mountain in the 1730s in accordance with the customs of free settlement in Massachusetts. The 3rd Lord Robert Livingston aggressively defended his rights as patent holder, rights along the fluid frontier of two colonies with very different populations and histories of land tenure. At dawn on April 15, 1755, Willem Rees was at the home of his brother Andries on the mountain and was killed by Livingston's overseers while resisting their efforts to evict the family.

This event sparked what amounted to a low intensity shooting war between Livingston and those he considered rebellious tenants. Andries Rees and a large body of men descended on the Livingston Manor's Iron works on Roeliff Jansen Kill and held the workers hostage, removing some for imprisonment in Springfield MA in retaliation for the death of Willem Rees. In 1756 Andries Rees and other rival claimants secured their own patent from the Stockbridge Indians in Massachusetts to form the Township of Taughkinnuk in present day Mt. Washington. He signed the document "Andrew Race", an Anglicization that shows where his loyalties lay. Livingston's overseers evicted him and burned several houses on the Mountain late in 1756. The dispute lingered on until the Revolution, when in 1779 Mt. Washington was formerly incorporated as a Massachusetts Town.

Mt. Race is one of the loveliest and wildest mountains on the Taconic Plateau. Descendants of the original Dutch settlers (Spoors, Van Deusens, and Whitbecks) still live on Mt. Washington and in surrounding towns. The Race Cemetery in Egremont MA contains many old family graves.

As for the Livingstons, they remained prominent in New York and in the formation of the early United States. Phillip Livingston was a signer of the Declaration of Independence and his brother Robert was actively involved in the small group that drafted the document with Jefferson's leadership. My grandmother was Clara Leanor Livingston, a forward facing woman of great determination who only shared detailed stories of her past in her final years. Her branch of the family had come far down in the world when she was born and didn't put much stock in its pedigree. Phillip Livingston is supposed to be our direct ancestor, a link someday I may be able to prove.